It's hard not to hold some degree of admiration for The Maccabees.
Whether your boat gets floated by the street-urchin powerpop of early Weller or the sophisticated Wildean excesses of The Smiths, the Brighton quintet have more than their fair share of each in abundance. So from the outset, 'First Love' starts off like an express train of one-note reflexes and acerbic vocals, but as with all great pop songs, there comes a twist.
"Are you cool?" asks Orlando Weeks in a most inquisitive manner, before mischievously adding "Symmetri-cool, analyti-cool..." and so on until the song builds up into a minor explosion of heavyweight proportions.
While this may not have the immediacy of previous single 'Latchmere', it's a more-than-sufficient introduction, for the average daytime radio listener, to some of 2007's stars to certainly be.
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8Dom Gourlay's Score